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Category: quantum physics – Page 476

Gearing up for mobility’s future with quantum computing

Any physical object, alive or inanimate, is composed of atoms and subatomic particles that interact in different ways governed by the principles of quantum mechanics. Some particles are in a pure state—they remain fixed and unchanged. Others are in a quantum state—a concept that can be difficult to understand because it involves having a particle occupy multiple states simultaneously. For instance, an electron in a pure state spins up or down; in a quantum state, also referred to as superposition, it spins up and down simultaneously. Another quantum principle states that particles can be in a state of entanglement in which changes in one directly affect the other. The principles of superposition and entanglement are fundamental to quantum computing.

Quantum bits, or qubits, are the smallest units of data that a quantum computer can process and store. In a pure state, qubits have a value of 1 or 0, similar to the bits used in computing today. In superposition, they can be both of these values simultaneously, and that enables parallel computations on a massive scale. While classical computers must conduct a new calculation any time a variable changes, quantum computers can explore a problem with many possible variables simultaneously.

Existing computers, although sufficient for many applications, can’t fully support all of the changes required to create a connected and intelligent-mobility ecosystem. Quantum computing (QC) could potentially provide faster and better solutions by leveraging the principles of quantum mechanics—the rules that govern how atoms and subatomic particles act and interact. (See sidebar, “Principles of quantum computing,” for more information). Over the short term, QC may be most applicable to solving complex problems involving small data sets; as its performance improves, QC will be applied to extremely large datasets.

China introduces largest quantum cloud computing platform

China Mobile on Saturday launched the largest quantum cloud computing platform in China along with China Electronics Technology Group Corp (CETGC), vowing to take quantum computing to a new level of practical use.

As the country’s most recent computing platform, it achieved hybrid computing of both quantum and general computing power for the first time in the industry, China Mobile said in a statement.

The platform was unveiled at the 2023 China Computational Conference in Yinchuan, Northwest China’s Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.

With CETGC’s ability to self-design and build 20-qubit quantum computing chips, the platform is linked with advanced 20-qubit quantum computers, giving its users an open quantum fusion computing power testing environment.

Scientists kill brain cancer with quantum therapy in a first

Scientists propose a spray that will make the most aggressive brain cancer tumors commit suicide. This spray contains bio-nanoantennae, special molecules that can alter cells at the quantum level.

Scientists at the University of Nottingham have devised a unique spray treatment method to cure glioblastoma, a highly aggressive brain cancer that annually kills over 10,000 people in the US.

They also claim this is the first-ever quantum therapeutic approach that shows cancer can be eliminated via quantum signaling, i.e., by making changes in the biology of cells at a quantum level.

Nonclassical Mechanism of Metal-Enhanced Photoluminescence of Quantum Dots

Metal-enhanced photoluminescence is able to provide a robust signal even from a single emitter and is promising in applications in biosensors and optoelectronic devices. However, its realization with semiconductor nanocrystals (e.g., quantum dots, QDs) is not always straightforward due to the hidden and not fully described interactions between plasmonic nanoparticles and an emitter. Here, we demonstrate nonclassical enhancement (i.e., not a conventional electromagnetic mechanism) of the QD photoluminescence at nonplasmonic conditions and correlate it with the charge exchange processes in the system, particularly with high efficiency of the hot-hole generation in gold nanoparticles and the possibility of their transfer to QDs.

Researchers make a significant step towards reliably processing quantum information

Using laser light, researchers have developed the most robust method currently known to control individual qubits made of the chemical element barium. The ability to reliably control a qubit is an important achievement for realizing future functional quantum computers.

The paper, “A guided light system for agile individual addressing of Ba+ qubits with 10−4 level intensity crosstalk,” was published in Quantum Science and Technology.

This new method, developed at the University of Waterloo’s Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC), uses a small glass waveguide to separate laser beams and focus them four microns apart, about four-hundredths of the width of a single human hair. The precision and extent to which each focused laser beam on its target qubit can be controlled in parallel is unmatched by previous research.

REM Atoms and Nanophotonic Resonator Offer Path to Quantum Networks

Researchers at Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics (MPQ) and Technical University of Munich (TUM) demonstrated a potential platform for large-scale quantum computing and communication networks. Secure quantum networks are of interest to financial institutions, medical facilities, government agencies, and other organizations that handle personal data and classified information due to their much higher level of security.

To create an environment that supported quantum computing, the researchers excited individual atoms of the rare-earth metal erbium. The excitation process caused the erbium atoms to emit single photons with properties suitable for the construction of quantum networks.

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